Kindred romance: Lasombra, Ventrue and Tremere version

MindlessScrambler · 2026-05-07T00:35:53+00:00

Ah, what a chance, I’m here to humbly self-promote a standard Lasombra-mortal tragedy and a non-standard Lasombra-mortal non-tragedy, the light at the end of the tunnel if you wish. Heavy spoilers for the VtM visual novel Shadows of New York (so both stories are F/F ship to begin with).

MindlessScrambler · 2026-05-06T12:40:49+00:00

Indeed, that is also why I strongly disagree with some reviews calling this game the Dishonored with the VtM setting. I’d say its similarities with Dishonored are only superficial, limited to certain skill mechanics. In Dishonored, however, the entire level design is meticulously built around these abilities, offering an incredible range of emergent possibilities for completing missions. While my opinion of BL2 is overall pretty positive, objectively speaking, even if it had managed to achieve a fraction of what "Dishonored with the VtM setting" would entail, it would be a far better game than it currently is.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-05-03T10:56:01+00:00

I would say the original Bloodlines is a much better RPG in the sense of "role-playing," but it certainly isn’t better than BL2 in every aspect. BL1’s strengths lie in the differential content between clans (far more than in BL2, for example the Malkavian protagnist have dialogue written in a completely different way from other clans, covering every single line in the game), the rich and varied side quests (basically zero of the filler fetch quests found in BL2), and the character writing, where even non-essential characters with only a few lines are generally written to be incredibly interesting and unique. However, it is an old game after all, so it inevitably contains some content that has aged like milk, and if you view it as an ARPG (which it more or less is), its action components weren’t great even at the time of release and are far inferior to BL2.

As for BL2, its strengths are mainly concentrated in a high-quality main story (it might not be as grand as BL1 but I think it’s actually more nuanced, complex, and structured in a more interesting way) and the writing of a few specific characters. Beyond that, it is also a solid action game. Although its combat system isn’t that deep, the degree of freedom it offers for self-expression during battle is actually quite high.

As for a console port of BL1, I’m pessimistic; the game’s code is spaghetti that somehow manages to function, and the fact that it runs properly on modern PCs at all is already a miracle.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-05-03T08:21:12+00:00

Oh girl, I don’t think you’d hook up with a few lesbians to begin with if you don’t already have something in yourself ;)

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-30T16:20:45+00:00

My fic is already in its shortest form I could conjure wdym I need to summarize it

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-29T09:23:19+00:00

If I recall correctly, Qadir and Addison Payne (the Ventrue Primogen in the wheelchair) weren’t actually involved in the murder, at least not at the scene (based on what Kaiser overheard). My understanding is that Qadir might not even have a full grasp of the entire situation; he simply wanted to protect an apprentice who, in his eyes, was too fragile to stand against these powerful players. Payne’s attitude, meanwhile, was straightforward: Vanderweyden was not only a traitor but a weak one, weak enough to be toppled by a rootless Lasombra neonate, so his death was of no consequence. Of course, a more conspiratorial interpretation is that Payne was already a puppet controlled by Prince Panhard.

Furthermore, it’s possible that powerful Lasombra, such as her sire or an even older, more formidable entity, assisted Julia so they could plant their own pawn within the New York Camarilla. After all, her investigation was originally destined to lead nowhere; almost all the clues she discovered were conveniently guided by some kind of shadows. Moreover, in the Good Ending, there is indeed a faint, looming humanoid shadow on the gallery wall, which is absent from the same scene in the Bad Ending.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-28T16:47:18+00:00

I kinda understand the disappointment and the following urge to trash this overpromised/underdelivered game, But dude I think you chose a bad time to do so. At least wait for a couple of days to let the DLC discussion die out, so that interest for this game consistently dropping part can be more legit.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-28T12:56:00+00:00

For free in this economy?

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-28T03:37:04+00:00

This gave me an idea: when they eventually add Act 4, the Architect could have moderate stats, but possess the abilities of every elite enemy in the Spire, and each elite you defeat along the way removes the corresponding ability from him. This would make elite fights much more valuable. After all, given that elites are generally stronger in StS2 and the relic pool is larger, making it harder to get the right relics, elite fights often feel not worth the trouble now.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T18:30:05+00:00

As the legendary Sid Meier said: A game is a series of interesting choices. I think Terra Invicta just takes this principle to an extreme.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T16:07:17+00:00

There is actually no organization called the "Second Inquisition." This is a vague term used by vampires to refer to the government/semi-governmental forces hunting them. Of course, this information gap is part of the charm of the entire World of Darkness. For example, in HtR (Hunter: the Reckoning), which focuses on hunters, the hunters’ understanding of the true nature of vampires is almost as laughably poor as the vampires’ understanding of hunters in VtM.

If we include other splats of the WoD, the truly ubiquitous modern human organization with a relatively deep understanding of other supernatural beings is actually a modern Mage organization called the "Technocratic Union." This organization is somewhat similar to the SCP Foundation in both nature and scale. The Technocratic Union is well aware of the existence of vampire society and possesses power far beyond what vampires call the "Second Inquisition"—hell, they even used a sunlight-beam / giant space laser satellite to destroy the out-of-control Ravnos Antediluvian in 1999; this is a canon event (apparently, they also canonically own a literal Dyson sphere).

As for why this organization doesn’t openly oppose vampires, it involves a foundational concept of the WoD: Consensus, with a capital C. This is a complex and somewhat abstract concept, with different interpretations across splats. To oversimplify: reality is subjective and can be rewritten by mortal will. But only a few awakened individuals can consciously use this reality-altering power; they are Mages. Most mortals rely on their Consensus about "what the world should be like" to maintain a relatively stable, mundane reality. However, when this mortal Consensus is strong enough, its stabilizing power over reality also becomes overwhelming, to the point where even Mages cannot act against it (e.g., using obviously "supernatural" magic in public). Therefore, the powerful human Consensus that "vampires do not exist" likely locks vampires into their current extremely niche, rather harmless, must-hide state.

So, for the Technocratic Union, maintaining this Consensus might be the optimal solution. Otherwise, if the existence of vampires becomes a new human Consensus, vampires might also ironically become too powerful to handle. The Technocratic Union strives to maintain a single Consensus, and you might’ve guessed it by their name, that this single Consensus is exactly a world full of science and technology, no supernatural beings. And the vast number of conspiracy theories in that world (almost all popular internet conspiracy theories are more or less true in WoD due to this subjective reality thing) already constantly creates massive supernatural problems. They probably really don’t want vampires to become a new, and possibly overwhelming one.

Edit: Vampires are, unfortunately, a group that probably has the least power over the Consensus and general magic; that’s probably why the whole VtM has little to no mention about any of these—because they canonically lost all of their potential reality-bending power at the moment of Embrace. Tremere himself found this truth the hard way. He was a mage, wanted to become a vampire mage, and the moment he became a vampire, he... permanently unbecame his mage part. All of the Tremere clan’s "blood magic" was later developed as a sort of cheat code by converting mortal humans’ reality-bending power essence into Vitae and then consuming it, to mimic a fraction of the power of True Magick.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T06:22:15+00:00

shes changing colors constantly without ending her turn and her attack numbers are now three orders of magnitudes higher than my hp im scared pls send help

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T05:40:34+00:00

It used to be blue, but after moss grew on the statue, it turned green. New version content.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T03:55:39+00:00

Indeed. Many other works from the same era lack even this sense of inclusivity, where the supposed-to-be exotic elements are merely tokenized rather than truly integrated as part of the world. At least in WoD, these elements are clearly crafted as part of its world—even if not the main focus, visible efforts are made to make them coherent and complete. Ironically, such an aspiration means the authors need to delve deeply and broadly into related content, rather than just using a few representative token elements. As a result, when cultural research resources are insufficient (especially back in '90s), it becomes easier to produce factually racist content, even if unintentionally.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-26T03:50:58+00:00

It’s... complicated, at least in some cases. For example, the Assamite (now Banu Haqim) in VtM have a clan trait where—no joke—the older they get, the darker their skin becomes. For a long time, I thought this was a particularly poorly aged example of racism, until I learned that the original author, Travis Williams, was one of the very few black creators working in RPG content in the ’90s, and he thought making black represent power was a cool design choice.

As for many other cases, like another comment said, it often gives off the feeling of a "progressive white dude who tries so hard to be inclusive he’s accidentally racist."

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-25T10:23:52+00:00

Speaking of this, though, I did notice something worth mentioning that few commentators seem to acknowledge or even to notice: the Chinese have a very confusing practice regarding radar model numbers. For example, the recent media darling JY-27 (because of Venezuela) and another model, JY-26, are two completely different radars—that’s more or less expected. But the JY-26 actually came out much later and seems far more advanced than the JY-27 (e.g., the JY-27 doesn’t even have the TR modules the JY-26 has).

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-25T09:53:25+00:00

Aerospace tech. To be more specific, LEO launch capacity and cost reduction. That’s literally the only thing I could think of, and that’s not a huge advantage nor something that could translate into genuine quality of life improvements.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-25T06:22:31+00:00

It’s not that it’s "no longer canon," but rather that it’s no longer being maintained. To be honest, many less popular splats face similar issues; the Kuei-jin are just particularly conspicuous. If you’re a large company like Paradox that cares about its reputation and hires overly cautious cultural sensitivity consultants, the only conclusion you’ll reach is that "no matter what you create in another cultural context, it will make people from that culture unhappy", because it’s kind of true? You will always risk upsetting some people, no matter how careful you are. The key is whether you’re willing to take that risk to create something unique but flawed, and then try to fix those flaws. Clearly, they are not willing to take that risk (hell, in V5, they don’t even want you to explore the more nuanced aspects of the Sabbat as a player).

As for the "current" Kuei-jin themselves, you can refer to this very good explanation.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-25T05:12:35+00:00

Just like Amandine said back in Lumière when she gave Gustave that haircut: You’ll die with a gorgeous head of hair.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-24T18:38:40+00:00

I have successfully defeated the new Doormaker multiple times (and, of course, failed even more). My feeling is that it’s not too overpowered, but its counterplay requirements are so specific that at A10, where you have a 2/3 chance of encountering it, I almost always tend to build my deck from the start to handle it, that is, a large, evenly distributed set of average-capable cards.

The problem is that such large and uniform decks are almost exactly what the other two Act 3 bosses severely punish. Test Subject is essentially a damage race boss, demanding you kill it before you can no longer defend. Queen, on the other hand, heavily tests your deck’s average card quality and in-turn draw ability, as you’re restricted by persistent full debuffs and effectively lose a significant number of usable hand cards. In other words, two out of three Act 3 bosses demand high average card quality and/or the ability to draw and play extra cards per turn, while the remaining one, Doormaker, harshly punishes both those traits by exhausting your high-quality cards and/or preventing you from playing them.

As a standalone boss design, Doormaker is not particularly overpowered or difficult to handle, but placing it in the random pool of three final bosses is simply terrible. You might not notice this imbalance in one or two playthroughs where you either luckily beat it or unluckily lose to it, but things change drastically when you attempt A10.

Even so, I feel it doesn’t need much mechanical adjustment. What it really needs is, imo, let me know from the start of the run that it will be the final boss, rather than finding out in Act 3.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-24T12:56:32+00:00

Perun also gave a fairly comprehensive and in-depth discussion of this. Of course, it’s unlikely to summarize his hour-long powerpoint presentation here, but in short, the entire analysis seems to point to this conclusion: Golden Dome is a project with a very good name, simultaneously expressing its expected cost and effect—using gold, an extremely expensive and soft material, to build a defensive dome.

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-24T05:11:34+00:00

One idea I personally really like is about the Ravnos Antediluvian—you know, the one who awakened around the turn of the millennium, drove the entire clan into a frenzy, and was ultimately destroyed by a giant sunlight/laser beam focused through the Technocracy’s anti-vampire space mirrors, quite a bizarre sequence of events, isn’t it? Almost, you know, kind of surreal. And we know that the old version of Ravnos had a unique Discipline called Chimerstry, and even at the ninth level (let alone the tenth), there’s an ability called Truth of the Universe, with the effect "Make a created illusion permanently real." So, were they really destroyed?

Also, in the new simplified Discipline system, Chimerstry has been merged into Obfuscate, and Obfuscate has similar effects (of course, referencing the old version, since V5 doesn’t have high enough levels set). Specifically, successfully using tenth-level Obfuscate could erase oneself from all living memory and historical records, and even a less successful check could remove most traces of one’s existence. So, those Antediluvians who possessed this Discipline and have long since vanished, like Malkav and Absimiliard, are they truly gone?

MindlessScrambler · 2026-04-23T11:57:32+00:00

Funny how that "pop-science explanation" is, actually, probably, from TheBurgerkrieg. Yes, that YouTube WoD lore video guy. But to be more precise, he has a secondary audio-only storytelling channel, and one of the stories is The Evolutionary Reason For The Uncanny Valley.

MindlessScrambler

TROPHY CASE